Red Mosquito

Strat wrote:Jeff rules.

Strat wrote:Of course his voice is awful but i actually like what he does here. The music in almost every song is very appealing to me. Super interesting textures and sounds.

It feels like one long musical interlude accompanying one mans diary.

Jeff rules.

VinylGuy wrote:yeah, thats a good insight on the album.
Im not bothered by the vocals at all. I like them enough.

I Hear Ya has become a favorite these days.

VinylGuy wrote:yeah, i think its its best. Its super cohesive.

1. I should be outside
2. Heaven Hell
3. Tone
4. While my heart beats

Wicks and Pearl Jam bassist Jeff Ament have known each other for years, but it wasn’t until now that they dove into a new project, called Deaf Charlie. Both had the demands of their main gigs put on hold during a pause, a relatively rare occurrence for them.

“We’ve been talking about it forever, but it was just like we never, neither of us have ever had the time,” he said.

Wicks said they were both game to try anything. “Jeff said, ‘The only rule is there’s no rule, and so that was sort of the mantra going into it.’ ”

For instance, the first single, “Something Real,” has Ament singing in a falsetto.

“He’s got this incredible voice and for me, that was the funnest part," Wicks said, getting to act as a second set of ears, "cultivating that and playing producer.”

Besides recording together, they could exchange tracks without worrying about a looming deadline.

“He just heard things in these songs that I didn’t hear,” Ament said earlier this summer. “So I got excited about that and said, ‘Well, you just take them wherever you want,” he said. He thinks Wicks is expressive and meticulous, and “sometimes this stuff takes a while, so there’s no end game. It’s not a band,” more of “a big art project.”

They released the track with a video that features a group of younger Missoula musicians, including keyboardist Connor Racicot, that he met through Drum Coffee. (He employs a lot of musicians and artists.) Tenor saxophonist Cade Chastain plays a free-ranging solo, after Ament encouraged to go far out and make it sound like Albert Ayler.

They contributed to a number of tracks, although there’s no release date in mind for the album yet, as Ament just released a solo album, “I Should Be Outside,” based on a different batch of material made during COVID.